NCDC declares 2020 Lassa fever emergency phase over

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control says the emergency phase of this year’s Lassa fever outbreak is over.

The NCDC, in a statement on Tuesday, said this followed the successive decline in cases below the emergency threshold and an epidemiological review carried out by it and the World Health Organisation.

It said the Lassa fever case count had significantly declined in the last three weeks and had now dropped below levels considered to be a national emergency.

The NCDC said there was a decline in case fatality of Lassa fever from 23% in 2019 to 19% in 2020, adding that it also supported peer to peer training by creating exchange programmes between states, treatment centres and laboratories.

The NCDC had January 24 declared a Lassa fever outbreak and activated a national Lassa fever Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) in response to an increase in Lassa fever cases at the beginning of the year, exceeding the threshold for an outbreak.

Since the beginning of the outbreak, 979 confirmed cases and 188 deaths had been recorded from 27 states including the Federal Capital Territory as of April 19, 2020.